I found a really fascinating blog post, written by David Kudler, where he writes about book covers. Thank you very much David.
While the truism “You can’t tell a book by its cover” holds true in most of our lives, one place where it doesn’t, ironically, is in publishing.
Oh, it’s still true — the cover doesn’t necessarily communicate what’s inside (though it should). But potential readers ignore it almost universally — especially when it comes to ebooks.
The cover is the first and (in many cases) most important piece of information those readers get about a title. This time out, I’m going to look at what should go into designing a cover that works for, rather than against, your ebook.
The Cover’s Job
Whatever format a book is in (print, audio, or ebook), the cover has a very important job — apart from and in addition to being visually attractive. As readers of TheBookDesigner.com probably already know, that job falls into several very important parts. It must communicate:
- The genre/subgenre of the book
- The tone of the book
- The subject matter of the book
A cover makes a promise. It tells the reader very clearly — through words, but also through design — exactly what they’re going to read.
Have viwed many generic covers offered to authors which are cheaper that personal designs but they usually seem like calendar scene and might fit poetry books but not much else. One’s book cover is an announcement and a promise.
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You’re right. I love my covers and I doubt they would fit someone else’s story.
But I think that is such a unique cover, I could imagine it might help a self-published author who can’t spend too much money on book covers.
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Covers are the introductory handshake between author and reader and really needs to promise what they can expect as far as storytelling goes.
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I agree. That’s why I have someone on my side, who creates the most amazing covers. I can’t wait to see what she comes up with for the third book in the series.
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“introductory handshake” YES !
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I absolutely love that expression!
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